Chapter 133: Violation of Time
Eight beams of light escaped that gun barrel, followed by... nothing, no sound, nothing. Just eight rising lights.
But Lea could hear the anguish, the screams for vindication. Her eyes were wide open, as a vision appeared before her.
Countless people coming together, building a tower that threatens to reach heaven. United in their defiance of divinity. Struck down and divided by the God they feared. And united in resentment, hatred toward divinity.
A skilled weaver fell in front of people, stripped down to her bare skin by a goddess. Humiliated and laughed at, she decided to take her own life. But not before her hatred and fury cursed her silks, forever tightening that goddess' neck.
Dozens of people in sterile coats, standing around a dull grey core. That object bears no malice, but only hysteria and madness of the people who created it. Images flash through her mind, of explosions wiping out countries, mushrooms that grow to touch clouds.
If her fear were not sealed, she would be horrified at those visions.
But now all that remained was a morbid sense of curiosity. How can a world be so cruel? How can a world bear so much malice and evil?
And how can someone wield such evil with a serene and gentle smile?
The Light Seeker landed beside Lea, crouched down, and spoke in an ethereal, whispering voice.
"Hehe... I can see clearly now... You are not a Jester of Light. Ah, that means you are... hehehe...", they looked at Dawn, whose attention was on the Three Rings, "I won't spoil your play, fake Jester of Light~"
"How can you move?", she asked.
"You don't need to know, hehe...", they stood up again, "But that thing should make its way here right about..."
"Now."
The moment those beams of dancing light hit the Three Rings in the sky— the world flashed green. Entering another figure.
A grey woman wrapped in chains and black flame, holding a black hole orbited by emerald fragments.
"Hehe... I don't know how, but that Ego managed to convince the strongest Lord of Annihilation, The First Lord - The Nova Blight."
Lord of Annihilation... memories resurfaced. She remembered that was what Charlotte said The Heavenly Demon was.
And that woman is the Ego of the World? That mean...
Ideation began to piece clues together.
Charlotte once described Sinclair as the Ego of the world.
Bashie Mahzala said otherwise, and she believed the Jester.
Sinclair's title was "Nowhere Girl", she can be anywhere and nowhere at once.
Then... "Miss Mashhith", that was the person missing between all of this.
A being that appears seemingly out of nowhere, with only the wrongness as a warning. How it was an ally of Charlotte, lurking somewhere in that black and white void.
Miss Mashhith had somehow merged with Sinclair...
To think all of these major players were just right next to her...
And knowing she cannot do anything...
She was vexed.
!!!
Lea raised her hands, creating a shield out of her constructs, blocking the wind gathering around Charlotte.
"Why is she attacking The Three Rings?", she wondered.
"Hehe... that is just a personal thing; she hates everything with Equilibrium. But it is necessary, she needs to prov—"
Before the Light Seeker was able to finish, a golden lightning bolt struck Charlotte—
Boom—
And it was sent directly toward the Mist Lord. Lea saw Charlotte holding a slightly curved single-edged sword, raised in the air.
Did she just... parry lightning?
"That's Time's Chosen for you!!", they crackled, "Anyway, it's nice talking to you. I also want to get a shot at The Almighty!!"
And the God of Adventure dashed off, wanting to fight the god in the sky.
It was then the Ego performed its action.
That grey woman wrapped in chains and black flame pulled back her arm, the black hole pulsing with hunger as emerald fragments orbited faster and faster.
Lea's enhanced perception slowed time enough to see the motion - a perfect throwing stance, weight shifting, the impossible mass of compressed reality held casually in one hand.
No. No no no—
The Nova Blight was launched with force that cracked the air itself, leaving a trail of spatial distortions that looked like reality was tearing along a seam.
The black hole screamed through the battlefield, emerald fragments leaving streaks of annihilation in their wake.
Directly toward the Mist Lord.
Time seemed to stretch. Lea watched gods and demigods alike begin to scatter, their divine instincts recognizing extinction when it approached. If that hits the ground—
The explosion would be world-ending. The kind of detonation that cracked continents and boiled oceans in the most literal sense!!
The Nova Blight closed the distance in microseconds.
The Mist Lord's insect form began to disintegrate just from proximity, bugs evaporating before the black hole even made contact.
Then it pierced through the Mist Lord, going straight for the ground.
Someone has to—
A figure appeared between it and the white chalk world. As if they'd always been standing there and reality had only just noticed.
A man in tattered golden robes, missing his right arm, his face serene despite the approaching apocalypse.
Auger Maxwell.
His left hand, his only hand, rose slowly, palm forward.
"Testament of the Fallen King.", Auger spoke quietly, his voice somehow audible over the roaring approach of annihilation, "The Oath of Protection stands eternal!!!"
Golden light exploded from his body, not aggressive, but shielding. A barrier that didn't try to destroy the Nova Blight but simply... existed in opposition to it.
The black hole struck the barrier.
Reality screamed as the impact created a sphere of absolute destruction around the contact point—everything within fifty meters simply ceased, deleted from existence.
But Auger held.
His feet dug trenches in the earth. His body trembled. Blood poured from his eyes, nose, ears.
But he held.
The Nova Blight pushed against the golden barrier, trying to consume it, to annihilate it, to erase the man who dared stand in its path.
Auger smiled.
"Not... today..."
The black hole's momentum slowed. The emerald fragments' orbit destabilized. And with a sound like the universe sighing in relief, the Nova Blight stopped.
Held at bay by one man's impossible will.
Lea stared, her sealed emotions preventing the full weight of what she was witnessing from crushing her. Auger, broken, one-armed, and supposedly dying, had just stopped a weapon that could end the world.
His golden eyes found hers across the battlefield.
And despite everything, despite the pain, the blood, the impossible strain, he smiled.
"As the stories say, a Hero never arrives too late, or too early... just at the right moment..."
Then his legs gave out.
Lea could see the short figure standing next to him now.
A hooded young child, parts of her body burning in crimson flame. She turned, looking at Lea... half of her face was just a burning skull. The Goddess of Fortune, Lea's instincts told her.
Then Ideation came, explaining what just happened.
The only way he could defend against a world-ending threat was... to make an offer to the Goddess of Fortune.
He used causality to summon all the power of his future self. The power of a god he would become. All to save the world.
As a Hero.
As a human.
"No...", she realized something.
She moved forward before her body could heal fully. Solafant also realized something was wrong and moved as well.
Through the Fire Giants, around the massive blade of the bleeding Blood God— she could reach him.
She could reach him!!
"Do you know the price of violating time?", the whispers of the Goddess of Fortune reached her, merciful and gentle.
"To anger Time is to forfeit your life, even with the most minor of violations."
From the angles made by the debris, portals to another reality cracked open. And from them, black beasts made of geometric shapes emerged, wrong and painful to look at.
"I've said those words to you before.", the hooded goddess spoke with parting gentleness, "And I ask you here, would you make the same choice again?"
Auger turned to Lea, who was just ten meters away. He didn't recognize her but still smiled, thinking she was another person wanting to save him. He looked past her, looking at Dawn far away.
"To save the world from certain doom, only for the price of my life?"
He mouthed an apology to Dawn, a whisper only Lea could hear.
"Isn't the price too cheap?"
The Beasts of Time descended.
They didn't kill quickly.
Geometric jaws tore into his legs first, pulling in opposite directions. Auger screamed, the first sound of pain Lea had ever heard from him. His golden barrier flickered, trying to protect himself, but Time's punishment could not be denied.
Another beast bit into his shoulder, ripping downward. His remaining arm separated from his body with a wet tear.
Too close.
But always too far.
The beasts consumed him piece by piece, each bite deliberate, prolonging agony. His golden eyes never left Dawn's direction, even as his body was dismantled.
I'm sorry... he mouthed again.
Then his head was torn free.
Lea stood there, Solafant ran forward, trying to preserve what was left of Auger, fighting against the Beasts of Time.
They were able to kill a few, yet almost all of them escaped back into the cracks they came from. To them, it was only a job.
"Why didn't you do anything?", Solafant questioned the Goddess of Fortune, anger clear in his voice.
She only looked up, giving him a gentle smile, "You can call me Kahelzar, Void Touched. And why I didn't do anything, isn't it simple?"
"If I was able to fend off the Beasts of Time, there would be a next time, and a next time, forever until he is devoured."
"If he evades them further, the Warden of Time will take drastic measures. The fact that you remember him, the fact that he still did what he did today, means that the Warden didn't erase him out of existence to begin with."
Devoured by the Beasts of Time, but can still be remembered.
To save the world, that price was objectively the cheapest.
"And for that, this humble shepherd shall remember him."
Lea could only stand there, letting her armor cover her face to hide her tears.
She turned to Dawn in the far distance; the princess was on her knees, tears streaming down from her shocked expression.
The person who was like an uncle to her had died. Her sadness was undoubtedly more painful than Lea's.
He went out as a Hero who saved the world.
But it was not over yet.
She stared at the black hole, The Nova Blight, floating upward while piecing itself back together. It became an emerald beast, standing on four legs with that black hole as its head.
The first thing she heard from it was laughter. A melodious and haunting laugh. As if it was mocking Auger's death.
"Beautiful... an end... worthy...", it crackled.
Then it turned to the Ego in the sky, hovering above the decomposing corpse of the Mist Lord.
"Listen, I reclaim my Authority as the World."
This event was not over.
And for a brief lapse in concentration, she sensed a runner faster than light... grab hold of something.